Quotes from David McCullough

I would pay to do what I do if I had to.

May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof.

They must be cool but determined...he threatened instant death to any man who showed cowardice.

...Had proven himself a leader of remarkable ability, a man not only of enterprising ideas, but with the staying power to carry them out.

All the money anyone needs is just enough to prevent one from being a burden to others. -Bishop Milton Wright

I just thank my father and mother, my lucky stars, that I had the advantage of an education in the humanities.

To shut yourself from history is to shut yourself off from say music or painting or the theatre, literature for the rest of your life. It would be to cheat yourself of the pleasures of life.

The great thing about the arts is that you can only learn to do it by doing it.

To me history ought to be a source of pleasure. It isn't just part of our civic responsibility. To me it's an enlargement of the experience of being alive, just the way literature or art or music is.

History is a guide to navigation in perilous times. History is who we are and why we are the way we are.

A nation that forgets its past can function no better than an individual with amnesia.

History isn't just what happened, but what happened to whom and why and what would have been different if the cast of characters had been different.

You can't be a full participant in our democracy if you don't know our history.

To this noble end the delegates had pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

My shorthand answer is that I try to write the kind of book that I would like to read. If I can make it clear and interesting and compelling to me, then I hope maybe it will be for the reader.

There is only one person who can measure your success. That person is you.

To go back and read Swift and Defoe and Samuel Johnson and Smollett and Pope - all those people we had to read in college English courses - to read them now is to have one of the infinite pleasures in life.

Real success is finding your lifework in the work that you love.

History is a guide to navigation in perilous times. History is who we are and why we are the way we are.

A nation that forgets its past can function no better than an individual with amnesia.

History is who we are and why we are the way we are.

There is only one person who can measure your success. That person is you.

Spotting talent is one of the essential elements of great leadership.

Books can change your life. Some of the most influential people in our lives are characters we meet in books.